The first time I heard of Jayanta Mahapatra was in 1977 when I was a post-graduate student of English literature at the University of Hyderabad. The department was aptly housed in the former residence of poet Sarojini Naidu: her daughter, Padmaja Naidu, had gifted it to the university. At that time, the department boasted of a galaxy of Indian English poets like Shiv K. Kumar, Meena Alexander, and Arvind Krishna Mehrotra. It filled me with pride that a poet from Odisha, my home State, figured in the reading list of this anglicised department. Postcolonialism, regional writing and translation were yet to arrive in English literary studies in India.
Years later, in 1998, Orient Longman (now Orient Blackswan) invited Mahapatra to Hyderabad for a book promotion, and asked me to accompany the poet. By then, I had joined the faculty of my alma mater, after higher studies elsewhere. The publishers felt that Mahapatra would feel comfortable with a fellow Odia around. We spent time together at the guesthouse of Osmania University in Hyderabad: it is here that I discovered that beneath the serious veneer of the poet, there was a genial and softer self, somewhat shy and sensitive. While he maintained a studied silence during the trips to various colleges, bookshops, and universities in the city, he opened up over breakfast at the guesthouse, telling me about his difficult childhood and life of struggle. “I have never been able to feel the usual affinity with my mother. I often longed for someone in whom I could confide—like a sister or a cousin of my age—but I didn’t have any,” he said candidly.
Also Read | Knowledge-keeper of Nagaland
My friendship with Jayanta Mahapatra continued over the years, strengthened during my visits to Cuttack. The care and hospitality of the poet and of his equally warm-hearted and gifted spouse, Runu Mahapatra, cannot be gainsaid. Alas, both are gone now. Jayanta Mahapatra passed away this morning, on August 27, at the age of 95; his spouse had preceded him.
Ancestral voices
Mahapatra’s poems carry ancestral memories, tinged with pathos. His grandfather’s diary dating back to the great famine of Odisha of 1866 remained his prized possession. Forced to convert to Christianity due to starvation, his grandfather had left behind a document that was both history and memory, a “scroll of despair.” It prompted him to write a poem titled “Grand Father” that first appeared in TheSewanee Review. Its opening lines go: “The yellow diary’s notes whisper in vernacular/ They sound the forgotten posture/ The cramped cry that forces me to hear that voice/ Now I stumble in your black-paged wake.”
“Poetry gave me an opportunity to love people, to love my fellow beings.”Jayanta Mahapatra
Born on October 22, 1928 in Cuttack, Odisha, Jayanta Mahapatra belonged to a lower middle-class family. He had his early education at Stewart school, Cuttack. After a getting a first-class Master’s degree in Physics, he taught at different government colleges of Odisha from 1949 to 1986.
Mahapatra authored 18 books of poems in his lifetime. He came to poetry late, at the age of 38, publishing his first poems when he was in his early 40s. He said later, “I began writing poetry at a late stage, like Wallace Stevens or Thomas Hardy. Poetry gave me an opportunity to love people, to love my fellow beings.” This empathy is apparent in all his collections, suchas Svayamvara and Other Poems, Close the SkyTen by Ten, A Rain of Rites, Life Signs and A Whiteness of Bone. He shared a special bond with A.K. Ramanujan, one of the finest poets in the Indian English poetic tradition.
President Pratibha Devisingh Patil presenting Padma Shri to Jayanta Mahapatra at the Civil Investiture Ceremony at Rashtrapati Bhavan in New Delhi on April 14 2009 | Photo Credit: R.V. MOORTHY
His long poem “Relationship” won him the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1981: he was the first Indian English poet to receive the honour. He recalled later that “Relationship” was “in many ways memorable for me, because it grew out of my dream memories of a past life, the past life of my land as well as mine. In that sense it was memory which built the poem, forcing me to go into my past, and then delivering me from it.”
Highlights
- Poet Jayanta Mahapatra leaves behind a rich legacy of poetry marked by lyricism and empathy
- Mahapatra won national and international recognition, and was counted among the pre-eminent Indian English poets
- Mahapatra’s poems create layers of meaning through irony and empathy, and carry a rich repertoire of memories
Mahapatra’s poems have appeared in many prestigious poetry journals from all over the world, such as Boundary, Chicago Review, The Hudson Review, The Kenyon Review, New England Review, The New Republic, The New Yorker, Poetry International, Poetry(Chicago), The Sewanee Review, Georgia Review, and more. He won national and international recognition, and was considered one of the pre-eminent Indian English poets.
Distinctive voice
Over time, Mahapatra forged a quiet, tranquil poetic voice of his own. He defined a poet in these terms: “A poet is a poet by virtue of what he sees or hears. Living as I do, beside a crowded road lined with shops, there is always something going on around me, and I am witness to things both trivial and catastrophic. There is no crisis here, just everyday happenings; but as sentient, thinking creatures what matters to us is life, which urges us to see beyond what we see.” At the same time, he said, “There is enormous tension involved in the writing of a poem. Even the simplest subjects, such as a star or a flower, make unimaginable demands upon us—upon our language, our emotions, and our judgement.” “Poetry”, he continued, “has always been a calling for me. That it could be some sort of career; no, never. It has sustained my life in ways I cannot describe. It has left me in a space to which I am bound and yet free.”
He prized the poetic image, which, he said, “helps me say what I wish to in a poem… The images make the truth more apparent. I think the idea of an image is very important in poetry because it turns into a moment.”
What about death? He replied, “Death has different meanings at different stages of your life. For example, when you are about 50, you are afraid of death as you see so many of your close associates dying. But when you come to my age, when you are 80-plus, the fear of death is no longer there. As I live in isolation these days, I get this overwhelming desire for death at times. But the next moment, the urge to live comes back.”
A poetry collection by Jayanta Mahapatra | Photo Credit: The Hindu
Jayanta Mahapatra’s poems create layers of meaning through irony and empathy; they carry a rich repertoire of memories, myths and metaphors from many lands and cultures, especially his own State, Odisha; they capture the lived experience in revelatory terms, creating the poetic artefacts that Walter Benjamin spoke of. Recurring images are of the temples in Puri and Konark, the sacred and now extinct river Chandrabhaga (also the name of the celebrated literary journal he edited for many years), and the rivers, Mahanadi and Kathajodi, which encircle Cuttack.
His legacy is of lyricism and craftsmanship, combined with themes of great personal and societal significance. It will be prized by generations of poets and poetry lovers.
Sachidananda Mohanty is former Professor and Head of the Department of English, University of Hyderabad. He has published extensively in the fields of gender, translation, and post-colonial studies. He is the former Vice Chancellor of the Central University of Odisha.
COMMents
COMMents
SHARE